LEADING WRITERS have paid tribute to Irish Timesliterary editor Caroline Walsh, recalling her generosity, intelligence and passion for literature.
Nobel laureate Seamus Heaney praised her contribution to Ireland’s cultural life. “It is shocking news, a sadness that will be felt by every writer in the country and by her wide circle of friends,” he said.
"Caroline was a generous woman and an important presence in the country in her capacity as literary editor of The Irish Times. She was greatly respected for her contribution to our cultural life and beloved for the kind and distinguished person she was. Our thoughts are with James Ryan and all of her family at this distressing moment."
John Banville, Ms Walsh's predecessor as Irish Timesliterary editor, praised her commitment to high journalistic standards. "Caroline was a good friend, and one of the very finest literary editors The Irish Timeshas had.
"She was unswerving in her commitment to quality in the reviews that appeared in her pages – and they were always very much herpages – and to the struggle to maintain cultural standards in general. She was intelligent, generous and funny, and I shall miss her greatly."
Colm Tóibín recalled their first encounters. “When I first met Caroline Walsh in the early 1970s in UCD she had the warmth, a gift for brightening up the day, which stayed with her always.”
Tóibín said that, in her role as an editor, she displayed "immense generosity, intelligence and flair. For her, the ethos of The Irish Times, what the paper meant in Ireland, was an idea that she treasured as something fundamental in her life."
Tóibín also recalled her love for her family. “One Sunday afternoon about a decade ago I bumped into her and her daughter Alice walking around St Stephen’s Green. They were the picture of happiness. They were out for no reason, they said, had gone for a walk just to enjoy each other’s company. So, too, if her son Matt appeared in the room, or if someone spoke of him, her eyes lit up with pleasure.
“With her husband James, she offered warm and constant hospitality. They lived in a Dublin where a new book or a new poem, or a new play were treated with enthusiasm and real seriousness. Everywhere she went she created a world where kindness held sway.”
Novelist and short-story writer Éilís Ní Dhuibhne described Ms Walsh’s death as “a terrible loss”, noting that “her passion was for fiction in general, but for the short story in particular”.
She added that as literary editor, Ms Walsh was “well aware of her role as a ‘gatekeeper’, a word I first heard from her. She held the review gate wide open and admitted people who had been previously kept at the tradesman’s entrance – a lot of those tradesmen were tradeswomen, actually.
“Also people who published in Ireland or wrote children’s books or wrote in Irish.”
Ní Dhuibhne also recalled Ms Walsh’s flair for conversation. “Caroline would have done most of the talking; she was a brilliant conversationalist, filling the unforgiving minute with more words than I could squeeze into half an hour, but she was a good listener too.”